Gary Lewis

Bingo! I checked two harnii and neither have a wire in the pin that the later one says is the Engage Light. Good call, Bill.

That being the case I'd go with a Motorcraft 2100 or 2150. They should be a direct bolt-on.

I wish! But I'm out of space, time, energy, etc. Have to concentrate on what I have rather than my dreams.

Yes, that is a win for everyone. On the carb, what are the plans for the truck's usage? And are we still talking about the 255 or the 300? If the 255, my thinking is that a Holley or similar carb is great for going fast, but an Edelbrock is better for daily driving. I know that's not a popular position, but it reflects my experience.

That's a really good look! I'm not sure I'd go white with the wheels as I'm liking them the way the are.

Man, I really like that! And it is not only the 351W/E4OD combo but EEC-V with MAF & SEFI. Should have decent MPG and it is smart enough to tell you what ails it when that happens so it will be easy to maintain.

Ty - Much easier when you have a community to ask questions of. Jim - I would never have thought of using the gas from the MIG welder! Good thinking!

Well done! And good pictures with explanations will help the next person that does that. Thanks!

Looks great! As for keeping things from moving, John/Machspeed and I were texting about that yesterday. I'm going to use some of the Noico self-adhesive foam insulation for that on mine. That way I can replace it if it gets soiled.

Glad it worked. It is amazing how tight that rivet can be in there with just side pressure. I think Shaun is the one that recommended that approach to me, so we have him to thank.

I'll check it out tomorrow. But I'll bet it does as they'll want to ensure that the BOO signal cancels things.

Good catch on the engage light, Bill. But the other two have the brake signal on that pin, as well as the adjacent pin. So, can that module be used in the trucks? The "engage" light will be an output, and the brake will be an input. An output would be a "low" to sink current through a bulb to light it. And the brake input goes to battery voltage when the brakes are applied. So for a brief time when the brake signal goes high the output will still be low. But it would only be a really brief time, like a microsecond, so there would probably not be any damage done. I think it would probably work. Have you tried it?

Good to know. Thanks for sharing.

Drill them at least the depth of the frame with a 1/4" drill bit. That takes the side pressure off, and then you should be able to drive them out.

The specifications are on the page at Documentation/Specifications/Towing. That's what you can tow legally. Some may tell you "I towed 15,000 lbs with my F100", and while that is possible it doesn't mean it is safe. And, it certainly isn't legal. If you were to have an accident and you were beyond the specifications in the manufacturers documentation you could be charged and, probably, found guilty.

Yippee! Just got notification that my order of wiring stuff for the inverter has shipped. When it gets here I can finally get started wiring up the inverter and then installing the compressor! Items Ordered: Price: Status: 1 of : 505103-025 QuickCable 1/2" Nylon Split Loom (25 ft) $20.90 Shipped 1 of : 5663-001B QuickCable 1" x 48" Black Double Wall Heat Shrink Tubing $18.24 Shipped 2 of : 6401-005E QuickCable 2 & 1 GA 5/16" Stud Straight MagnaLug (5 Pack) $23.32 Shipped

Will do, Jim. But I seriously doubt it will as there have been many times where the speedometer was steady. However, I suppose it is possible the gear was slipping and the speedo masked it? But I won't get to find out until maybe Friday. I ordered the new seal today and it is supposed to be in on Friday. And since it is coming via USPS, which usually comes by 10 AM, I might get it installed and take the truck for a spin. We shall see. And, I may take Bill's red Taurus amplifier with me to swap out and see if it does any better. That and trying David's suggestion of adding some slack to the throttle cable is about all that is left to try should securing the gear not work.

Glad you got it working. On the ignition switch, the problem you are experiencing is typical for this time of year. And that's because the lube in the mechanism and switch is drying out and the cold makes it worse. Read what is said on the Ignition Switch tab on the page at Documentation/Electrical/Ignition. You'll need to clean and lube the linkage and/or switch, and that's explained there. And, since you are just now seeing David's post I'm assuming that you didn't click "Alert me by email...", so didn't get an email notification to your own thread. So I'm "tagging" you via the Assignment option we've recently added, which will give you an email notification of my post. Then I'll come back and un-assign you so you won't have to do anything but respond.

Did some chatting with my nephew to get measurements on his "stack" of power supply shield, D1 Mini, and bits of the relay shield: To top of terminal strip: .925" To top of relay: 1.220" That works out very nicely since there appears to be 1.038" between the bottom cover when snapped into place and the top of the box. And since I don't need the terminal strip will will use something like this 4-channel MOSFET shield. The top of the speed control board is .711" from the top of the box. Judging by the pic below the bottom of the relay shield is .500 from the bottom. And the MOSFET shield says it is .063" thick. So that would mean the whole stack would be .563" and it should fit on top of the speed control board if I just depopulate it. But what I'm not sure about is how to mount the stack on the speed control board. http://www.garysgaragemahal.com/uploads/6/5/8/7/65879365/thinking-26_orig.jpg

In the previous post you can see an E7 version of the speed control module. Turns out I have at least three versions of the module: E3; E7; and the F1 that Bill gave me from the Taurus. And all use a chip with Ford #D9AF 14A607, but the E3 version has an A1B suffix while the other two have an A3B suffix, although the manufacturer's number is different between them. Here they are in the above order. Note that the first two, E3 and E7, appear to have the same board layout. But the F1 has a completely different board. Maybe it has better function?

In thinking about stuffing a D1 Mini in the speed control's amplifier box I measured it and found that it is 3.925" wide x 2.660" long x 1.196" deep inside. The board sits .711" from the top of the box, so that's not a lot of space above the board for the D1 Mini. But I could cut the board right behind the snaps in the case that hold it in place and have 1 3/4" to the back of the case. However, I'd probably want to just cut out the center of the board, as shown, which gets the 2 1/4" x 1 3/4" space that would be 1" high when the bottom cover is on. The D1 Mini by itself is only .28" high, but by the time the power supply shield is put on the bottom and the MOSFET shield is put on the top that may be a challenge. http://www.garysgaragemahal.com/uploads/6/5/8/7/65879365/thinking-26_orig.jpg

And while I'm thinking of Zener diodes, I see the need to them used in three places: BOO: As said, the brake input will go to battery voltage when the brake pedal is pushed, so I need to protect that input with a single-Zener arrangement and a current-limiting resistor, as shown below. Controls: Also mentioned is that pressing On will take that input to battery voltage so will also have to have a single Zener and limiting resistor. VSS: The input signal from the vehicle speed sensor is a sine wave and exceeds 20vp-p at 70 MPH, and is greater than 5v at 30 MPH. But instead of a single Zener I think I'll use a double-Zener arrangement as shown below. That will give me a good approximation of a square wave from the VSS and I should be able to get an interrupt to trigger off the leading edge, allowing me to easily determine speed as well as acceleration or deceleration.

That’s the good in it! Yep, there's always some good, and that certainly is good.

If the speed control is using PID then it has poor tuning. Sure would be nice to be able to change Kp, Ki, and Kd. (Which I will easily be able to do if I go with a microcontroller.) I, too, had a control systems class, including PID's, but that was probably before you were born. So I don't remember a lot of it. But what I do remember says that it isn't difficult to dial a system in if you go about it systematically. This page has a couple of suggestions on how to approach that. But Crossco has a good explanation of what each parameter does as well as suggestions for how to start tuning. As for the vacuum servo being part of the problem, I don't think so. I had an all-vacuum Dana cruise control system back in the late 70's and it worked superbly. It came with different orifices for tuning things as well as some potentiometers, and I was able to dial it in just like I liked it on an Audi 100LS with a manual transmission. But speaking of manual transmissions, Big Blue will cruise up just about any hill around here in OD on speed control. And I've seen a steady 2" of vacuum on the gauge while doing it. So the system is quite capable of opening the throttle plenty far enough, and holding it there for an extended period. On the control buttons, you are right. It appears the speed control module has a pull-up and most of the control switches have a fixed resistor to ground. So when that button is pushed you get a specific voltage, which the microcontroller will read on an analog-in pin. But the On switch takes the input to battery voltage so I'll have to put a zener diode on that to limit it to the max the input can handle. And Off grounds the input. However there is a BOO input. In the diagram below you can see it in the upper left, with the brake switch in series to the clutch switch. I think the way it works is that the module has a pull-up resistor but the clutch switch keeps that input connected to the resistance of the brake lights, so with the clutch engaged the module sees 0V. But if the clutch clutch switch opens the pull-up takes the voltage to 12v and the system is disengaged. And if the brake switch is closed the input sees 12v and the system is disengaged. I'll probably put that on an interrupt and when it goes high reset the "On" flag.

Yes, we are making progress. The forum is running on AWS servers, and a lot better I might add. But the email notifications aren't all working - yet. The sys admin, Pedro, that is working on it says he thinks he'll have those issues fixed by the end of the month. Then we need to sort out why we can't log onto the embedded version but can by going directly to it. Probably some setting I've not got right. And after that we can move.